Studied Sketches
by Raberba girl
Summary: They meet in a library; she doesn't pester him, he doesn't drive her away. But it'll become more than that. Platonic Zexion/Naminé.


Studied Sketches (rough draft)  
A Kingdom Hearts fanfic by Raberba girl

_Dedicated to Mirae-no-sekai, who introduced me to ZekuNami. :)_

Summary: They meet in a library; she doesn't pester him, he doesn't drive her away. But it'll become more than that. Platonic Zexion/Naminé.

A/N: Partially inspired by Roald Dahl's _Matilda_.

o.o.o

When she woke up and went to the kitchen there was some cereal left in the box, so she ate that and then picked up her notebook and crayons again and went to the park.

It was a long way to walk, but she'd been walking this way for a few weeks now since summer vacation started, and she didn't get tired anymore. She liked to draw where there was grass and trees and flowers. There were flowers at home, but they were all dead. The ones here were growing, and pretty.

She always sat under a tree, or sometimes on the steps of the Health & Science Library where there was shade. Otherwise it got really hot.

She was drawing a princess when a grown-up stopped next to her. Sometimes they did that - the ladies with lots of kids, or the policemen who always wanted to know where her parents were. She looked up and she was about to say 'My parents will be back soon,' but then she didn't say anything after all.

The man smiled at her. Most people looked nicer when they smiled, but not him. "Hello, little girl."

"Hello," she said. Then she wished she hadn't said anything.

"I was just talking to your mommy earlier."

No, he wasn't. Mommy was shopping and stuff with her friends.

"She asked if I could take you home for her while she goes to run a couple of errands."

_'I don't like him,'_ Naminé thought, surprised. The only people she didn't like were the boys and girls at school who were mean, but now she realized that she didn't like this man, either. She stood up.

"That's right, honey, come along with me."

He tried to take her hand. But she was holding her crayons tight, and before he could grab her she stepped away, then turned and walked to the library door.

"Honey, I'm talking to you," he said, sounding a little mad like she was ignoring him.

Well, wait, she _was_ ignoring him. You weren't supposed to be rude to grown-ups, so she wondered if she should say something. "I'm going to find someone," she said as she tried to open the door. It was heavy.

He almost grabbed her again, but then someone inside shoved the door open as they came out and Naminé went under his arm into the building. The air conditioner was on, it was cold.

Clutching her notebook, she walked under the bar and past the big desk at the front, and she could hear the librarian growling at the man to be quiet. While he was arguing with her, Naminé turned into the shelves.

_'Who am I looking for?'_ she wondered. Should she find somewhere to hide? _'I want Daddy and Mommy.'_ They didn't like strangers, either. The man would leave her alone if she was with them.

"Where is she?" she heard someone mutter on the other side of the shelf. It was him. He was looking for her.

Her chest hurt a little now, her heart was beating so fast. She went the other way and into the next aisle.

There was another man there, running his finger across the books like he was looking for something. His other hand was down right where she could reach it. He wasn't her daddy, but he looked like _somebody's_ daddy. She put her notebook under her arm and ran to grab the hand she could reach, because she didn't know what else to do. Her daddy was far away, so the only daddies who could help her were other people's.

He looked down at her. His hair was really long and covered one eye, but she could still see the other one, blue like hers. He didn't smile, but he didn't frown or pull away, either. They looked at each other.

Footsteps. She clutched his hand harder before she looked over her shoulder.

It was him. He was staring at her, walking toward them slowly. She wanted to run so much, but if she ran he was bigger and faster and he would catch her, and if she ran she would be all alone. She was scared to stay here, but if she stayed here she would still be with the other daddy. She didn't know if she could make her feet stay still for very long, though.

The other daddy turned the other way to look where she was looking. He pulled his hand out of hers, and for a second she couldn't breathe but then she felt his hand on her head instead, pulling her close against him, and she felt safer. "Is there a problem?" he asked calmly.

The bad man muttered something she couldn't hear and passed them and walked away.

The two of them didn't move for a minute. Then he took his hand away and looked at her for a while without saying anything. He still didn't smile. She looked back at him. Finally he went back to looking for the book he needed, and she waited until he pulled one off the shelf.

"Is that the right book?" she asked.

"We shall see," he said without looking at her. Then he walked away, and she followed him. When he sat down at a table covered with piles of books and papers, she sat in the chair next to him and put the notebook down on the table and started drawing again. She didn't feel like finishing the princess anymore, though, so she drew a picture of a monster chasing a little girl instead.

It was cold. Her dress was okay outside where it was hot, but here inside with the air conditioner, it was cold on her skin, and she started shivering.

Then it was warm. She looked up in surprise. He looked back at her for a while, then went back to putting sticky notes in the book he was reading. His sweater was so big around her; she happily pulled up her legs to her chest and buttoned the sweater around them, then picked up her notebook and went back to drawing.

A long, long time later, when the sun was dark and hot through the windows and the lady said into the microphone that the library was closing, her other daddy finally closed all his books and his computer and took some of them up to the desk. Naminé didn't want to be left behind. She grabbed her notebook and crayons again and hurried to catch up to him.

When he was taking the library card out he dropped his wallet, so she bent down to pick it up for him. It was open, and she saw the two cards on top. One was a picture of him in a little box, with his name next to it. The second name was really long and she couldn't read it, but the first one was spelled Z, e, x, i, o, n. She didn't know how to say it, but she could read it. Mr. Zexion. He didn't look like a Zexion, but maybe she didn't look like a Naminé, either.

The other card wasn't really a card, it was a picture. Mr. Zexion and a woman and a pretty girl with silvery hair down to her shoulders. They were all smiling. Naminé thought that Mr. Zexion looked a lot better with a smile, so he wasn't like the bad man at all.

When she looked up, she was surprised to see a hand held out to her. Mr. Zexion was looking at her, waiting. Oh - he wanted his wallet back, of course. She put it in his hand.

"Thank you," he said.

"You're welcome," she said.

She followed him out of the library until they got to where Cloak Street crossed Remembrance Lane. He kept going on Cloak. She watched him walk away, but to go home she had to turn onto Remembrance, so finally she sighed sadly and kept going home.

Mommy and Daddy were eating dinner and watching TV. "Hi," Naminé said when she came in. They didn't say anything or look at her, so she went to the kitchen to see if there was anything left over to eat. There wasn't, so she took a Pop-Tart to her room and ate it while she looked at her book with the animal pictures, and then she fell asleep.

The next morning was the same as most of all the other mornings, except this time there were only a few pieces of cereal left. She ate them, but she was still hungry, so finally she found some peanut butter and ate some of that with a spoon. Then she got her notebook and crayons and went to the park.

The bad man was there, walking around slowly like he was looking for something. He was looking at some of the other children, but they were all with their mommies and daddies, and then Naminé realized that she was the only little girl who was all alone.

He looked up and saw her. She turned and went to the library again. "Hey, honey-" Then she couldn't hear him anymore because she was inside and the air conditioner was humming.

She saw her other daddy right away this time. He was at the same table, with even more books than before, though right now he was typing on his computer. She went up to sit in the chair next to him again.

He looked at her. "Hello," she said.

"Hello," he said.

She put her notebook on the table and started to draw a picture of a man looking for something in a garden. It was cold like yesterday, so she took her sandals off and pulled her legs under her so she could sit on them and they'd be a little warmer.

"Perhaps you should wear a more suitable outfit if you know you're going to be in an air conditioned place for long periods of time."

It took her a minute to realize that Mr. Zexion had been talking to her. She looked up at him in surprise. "Oh." She thought a minute. She was wearing the same white dress she'd worn yesterday. All her other clothes had started to smell kind of bad so that she didn't like wearing them, but for some reason she didn't want to tell him that. Maybe when she took a bath again, she should bring them in the bath with her so they could get clean and not smell anymore. "I don't have any other clothes."

He looked at her some more. "Very well," he finally said, and her chest stopped feeling tight. He put his sweater on her again.

"Thank you," she told him.

"You're welcome."

They worked all morning. He read his books or put sticky notes in them or copied shapes onto a notepad or typed on his computer, and she filled page after page with drawings. Sometimes he would get up to look for more books, and she would quickly get up to follow him. After a while he started handing her one or two books to carry when he pulled a whole lot of them off the shelves, and she liked that she could help him.

She was in the middle of a picture about a boy reading a book about horses in a desert when she realized Mr. Zexion was staring at her. She looked up. Her stomach growled again.

"When are you going to eat?" he asked. His voice was quiet like it always was, but it surprised her a little because they hadn't said anything to each other all morning.

"I don't eat lunch in summer," she explained.

Just when she stopped waiting and was about to draw again, he asked, "Where are your parents?"

"Daddy's at work and Mommy is with her friends."

He turned in his chair to face her, and he didn't look happy. She wondered if she had done something bad. "Who looks after you?"

"Nobody. Just me."

He looked at her for a long time, and she couldn't look at his eyes so she looked at the floor instead and waited to be in trouble.

"...Come."

She didn't want to go, because it was bad when they took her away from the windows to punish her, but she didn't know what else to do. She held her notebook tight to her chest and waited as he put all the books on a Reserved cart and put his computer into the case. Then she followed him - she thought he was going to take her back somewhere, but he went for the front doors instead.

The sun was so warm after the air-conditioning. She felt a little happier as she tried to keep up, especially when she looked around for the bad man but couldn't see him anywhere in the park. Mr. Zexion went up to one of the food carts and looked at her again. "Do you like hot dogs?"

"I think so." She'd only had one once before, and it was a long time ago. It was food, and she would never not like food.

When he talked again, it was to the food cart man. "One hot dog, please. Put whatever she wants on it."

"Well, I can fix you right up," the food cart man said. "What would you like, sweetie? Mustard, ketchup, pickles?"

She stared. "I don't know."

Mr. Zexion was watching her. "Mustard is the yellow kind, it's slightly bitter. Ketchup is red, and more tart. There also appears to be cheese, which is yellow as well but not the same as mustard; I presume you know what cheese is?" He added very quietly to himself, "Not that I would venture to label the contents of that bottle as any sort of dairy product whatsoever..."

"May I please have some cheese?" she asked shyly.

"Sure thing, sweetheart!"

He didn't give her a piece of cheese, though. She stared at the hot dog he was holding out to her. "That's not mine. That's Mr. Zexion's." She still didn't really know how to pronounce his name, but she did her best.

"It's yours. I'm buying it for you."

"For me?" She was very surprised.

"No offense to this kind gentleman here, but I do not consider such a thing to be 'food' and would only consume it as an alternative to starvation."

"None taken," the food cart man mumbled.

She stared at them both some more before she finally put her notebook under her arm and took the hot dog in both hands. Then she stared at it again. "This is really for me?" She hadn't seen this much food for herself since the lunch tray she had on the last day of school.

"Let's go sit down so you can eat it."

There was a bench under a tree. Mr. Zexion sat way on one end of it, and she put her notebook down and climbed up carefully to sit close to him, still holding her food. He looked at her for a second, then looked away again. As she ate, he watched the children playing in the park, and she watched, too. She liked sitting with him.

When she was almost finished, she suddenly realized something. "Where's your lunch?" she asked.

"I have a small appetite." So that meant...? "I'm not often hungry."

"Oh." She couldn't imagine not being hungry. He gave her a napkin, and she wiped her hands. "Maybe you should eat even when you're not hungry." He was a lot littler than Daddy. Maybe he didn't grow bigger because he didn't eat much.

"You're probably right..." He sighed like he wasn't happy.

"You don't have to eat if you don't want to," she said quickly.

"No. I should." He sighed again, then got up. She quickly got up, too, and followed him when he went to look at all the food carts. She knew he didn't like the food carts, but he finally bought a sandwich from one. "Would you like a sandwich, too?"

"I already ate," she said in surprise.

"Are you still hungry?"

"...Yes," she said.

"Pick whatever you like."

For some reason, though, she could only eat a few bites before she felt full, so she wrapped the rest in a napkin to save for later when she was hungry again. Then she picked up her notebook, but she leaned her head against his arm as he ate, and she liked sitting next to him so much that she didn't really feel like drawing, either. She wished very much that he could be her real daddy, not just her other one.

"What is your name?" he asked suddenly.

Oh. She realized she had never told him. "I'm Naminé." Then, because it was polite, even though she'd met him yesterday, "It's nice to meet you."

He smiled just a little. "Likewise."

"I know your name already. It's Mr. Zexion."

He taught her how to pronounce it right, which made her happy. She sat up straight again and looked for the page in her notebook she wanted to show him. "This is your family."

After a while he said, "Yes. It is."

"I like the girl. She looked nice in your picture."

"Girl?"

Naminé pointed to the silver-haired person.

"...Lee is my son. Not my daughter."

"Oh." Oh well. "He's very pretty."

Mr. Zexion laughed a little. "I wonder what he would make of that."

When they went back to the library, Mr. Zexion took all the books off the cart again and put them back on the table. She meant to draw some more, but now that they had talked a lot, she didn't want to just sit and not talk for so long. "What are you looking for in all the books?"

He looked at her for a minute. "Well. My colleagues and I are studying a certain disease." He told her the name of it, but there was no way she would ever be able to pronounce it or spell it. He also explained a little bit about what happened to people who were sick with it.

"You mean like the cells _eat_ each other?" she said, her eyes wide.

"I suppose that's one way of putting it."

"Does it hurt when the sick cells eat the other ones?"

"...Not at first."

"Oh..."

"The disease is rare, and it mostly afflicts young children. We are searching for a way to treat it effectively, because right now almost no one survives it, and those who do are permanently disabled."

"That sounds bad."

"Yes," he said softly. "It is."

"Can I help?"

She was glad when he smiled again. "Do you know what you can do for us, Naminé?"

"What?" she asked eagerly.

"I know many children in hospitals all over the country who are suffering from this disease. I'm sure they would like very much to receive pictures from you that you have drawn just for them. They always like to have something new to look at, and to know that people are thinking of them and care about them."

"What should I draw?"

He made a list for her, names of children he knew and the things they liked best. She carefully put the list on the table above her notebook and got to work.

When the library closed and they were walking home together, Naminé asked if he was going to be in the same place tomorrow, too.

"Yes, but then that will be the end for a while. I have been gathering much information that I need to take back to my colleagues so we can begin a new round of experimentation, and that is something we will be doing in a laboratory far away from here."

"...Oh." She took his hand. "I'll miss you," she whispered.

He squeezed her hand back and said, "I will miss you also, Naminé." It was hard to leave him, but this time he was the one who stood at the crossing and watched as she walked away.

Mommy and Daddy were yelling so loud at the game show on TV when she got home that they didn't even hear her say hi. There was a slice of pizza left in one of the boxes... Naminé went and got it, watching them to make sure they weren't paying attention to her. Then she ate it quickly as she went down the hall to the bathroom.

This time she brought all her dirty clothes into the bath with her. She tried to wash them with the soap after she had washed herself, but they were all still really wet when she had finished. She draped them over the sides of the tub to dry, and then realized that she didn't have anything to wear. So she wrapped herself in a towel and lay down on her bed to wait for the clothes to dry, but then fell asleep.

She woke up because Mommy was shaking her and yelling at her, and she was confused because it was really dark outside. "Mommy?"

"What do you think you're doing, leaving your junk all over the bathroom?" Mommy yelled. "Get in there and clean it up!"

"I was trying to wash my clothes-" She stopped talking when Mommy slapped her.

"What do you think the washing machine is for, stupid?"

"I don't know how to use the washing machine..."

"Quit mouthing off," Mommy growled. "Get up _now _and get all your clothes out of the tub!"

It was hard trying to carry all of them. Mommy shoved them in the washing machine and threw soap in there and slammed the lid shut. "This is how you wash clothes, _stupid_," she said, moving the knobs and buttons at the top. "Stay in here and take care of your own laundry, I've _told_ you a million times to clean up after yourself and keep out of the way!"

"Yes, Mommy."

Mommy wouldn't let her come back into the rest of the house, so Naminé waited in the laundry room until the washing machine stopped making noise. Then she had to climb up on it to get all her clothes out of it, but when she put them into the dryer and closed the door, she couldn't get it to start. She twisted knobs and pushed buttons until it _finally_ started making noise, and then she tried to wait but she was really tired.

When she woke up on the laundry room floor, the house was very quiet and there was sunshine coming through the kitchen windows. She opened the dryer door and her clothes were dry, so she put some of them on. "Mommy? Can I come out now?" There was no answer. She was afraid to go out and look, but she couldn't stay in here forever because it was the last day he was going to be at the library and she _had_ to get out of here and go see him and finish the cards for the rest of the boys and girls on her list before it was too late. If Mommy was home and caught her she would just have to get in trouble, because she had to go out and look.

There weren't any cars in the driveway, so Mommy and Daddy were gone like usual. Relieved, Naminé ran to put her clothes back in her room and then found the sandwich she had hidden and ate that for breakfast. Then she took her notebook and crayons and went as fast as she could to the library.

She saw Mr. Zexion right away, but something was wrong. His computer and his books were all over the table like before, but he wasn't typing or reading, he was just sitting there with his face hidden in his arms like Naminé sometimes did at school when someone had been mean to her.

She ran to him. "Mr. Zexion? Why are you crying?"

He sat up slowly and wiped his eyes. "I...I wasn't crying."

Boys always lied about that kind of thing, so she pretended to believe him. "But you're sad?"

He didn't say anything. She climbed up into his lap to reach him so she could hug him, and he hugged her back really tight. "All this research," he whispered. "All these experiments, useless...it's far too late for Lee..."

"What's wrong with Lee?"

He stroked her hair. "My son Lee was one of the children who died from this disease," he said softly.

"He died?" she gasped.

"Yes...a year ago...it's been exactly one year. I've been working so hard towards finding a cure, or even a treatment that will have any significant effect at all, _anything_, but it'll never- It's too late. I will never see my son again."

She felt cold. "Is...Is it too late for all the other sick boys and girls, too?"

He looked at her. "...No." He closed his eyes. "They still live, at least."

"Oh." She was sad about Lee, but at least she hadn't lost all the others like she thought. "Well, it's not useless then, is it?"

He opened his eyes again and watched her for a while. "How old are you, Naminé?" he asked quietly.

She had to think about this. "What's today?"

He told her the date.

"Then today I'm seven," she realized.

He looked a little confused. "How old were you yesterday?"

"Six."

"...And your parents left you all alone on your birthday?"

"Are they supposed to stay?" she asked in surprise.

He closed his eyes again and held her close. She thought he might be crying again too, but she wasn't sure. Finally he said, "Come," and she didn't think she was in trouble this time. She hadn't been in trouble last time either, actually. She was happy to hold his hand and follow him wherever he went.

"I never had a daughter," he said as they walked, "and for several months now, I have no longer had a wife to consult, so I apologize ahead of time if I'm not very good at this."

"But you're good at everything."

"You only think that because of your perspective." He bought her some ice cream, and some for himself too when she asked what his favorite flavor was, then they ate it as they walked along past the shops. "What would you like for a birthday gift?"

"You mean like when the boys and girls at school get presents for their birthdays?"

"Yes. Except that this is _your_ birthday, so you are to choose something you would like for yourself."

"May I...may I please have some new crayons?" she asked. They got short so fast, and it was so hard to get more.

"Of course. You may also pick a new notebook, if you like."

"Really?!"

They were in the store for a long time, because there were _so many_ beautiful notebooks that weren't anything like hers with its plain paper cover. She finally chose one covered with soft white cloth, and stars on the front. There were so many blank pages in it...and the box of crayons he let her have was _huge_, different crayons just for each color...

The building they went to when she said she was hungry was so pretty, like a house with flowers all over. The ladies there wore pretty dresses, and there was a pretty tablecloth on the little table, and when Mr. Zexion told them it was Naminé's birthday, they put a beautiful sparkling tiara on her head and told her she could keep it. There was tea and little sugar cubes and sweet bread and fancy small sandwiches and little cakes, just like when Naminé played tea party with the nice girls at school, except this was a _real_ tea party. She realized it was her very first real tea party.

"I get a real tea party for my birthday?" she gasped.

"Yes. Do you...like it?"

"I like being with you," she said happily. "May I please pour your tea?" she asked, because she loved pouring from the tea pot.

"You may."

She felt like she was in heaven when they finally walked back to the library, with the tiara on her head and the bag with her new and old notebooks and crayons in one hand and Mr. Zexion's hand in the other. He sat back down with all his books and opened his computer, and she happily knelt up in the chair next to him so she could lean closer to the page and draw better.

"I made you a thank-you card," she told him when she finished.

He smiled a little when she set the card next to his book. _"Thank you Mr. Zexion for the wonderful birthday,"_ he read out loud. "Actually, the proper spelling is-" He looked at her staring at him. He smiled again, bigger. "Never mind. This is very well done, Naminé."

She smiled back, relieved. "Open it. I drew a picture inside."

He unfolded the card.

"This is you, and this is Lee, and this is Lee's mommy. I know you can't be together in real life, but at least you can all be together in the picture now."

He looked at the picture of his family for a long time. Then he asked her, "Naminé, may I please borrow a few of your crayons?"

She gave him the whole box and watched as he drew a girl with yellow hair next to the Zexion on the page.

"Who's that with your family?" she asked, wondering if it was who she thought it was.

"Her name is Naminé," he said. "Is that all right?"

"Oh, _yes_."

o.o.o

Author's Notes: And in my head, he adopts her just like Miss Honey does Matilda, and he and Vexen and Lexaeus find the cure, and everyone lives happily ever after. (Shut up, I'm a Disney fan. *sweatdrop*)

For the longest time, I had trouble thinking of a proper name for Repliku, but when I was outlining this fic I _finally_ figured it out. It's still kind of lame, but I figure 'Lee' is better than nothing. (And ftr, all the characters without names are throwaway OCs.)

I'd never even _thought_ of ZekuNami as a pairing, but I was going through Mirae's profile and noticed she'd written some stuff about them, and the thought intrigued me. While wondering if I could ever pull off something as odd as ZekuNami, the first plot bunny that came to me was of Naminé being an elementary school student with a crush on her teacher, Zexion. Somehow it ended up morphing into this story, though. I probably won't ever write the pairing as romance except for Mirae (and then only AU because I'm uncomfortable with it in canon), but I think Zexion & Naminé can be really cute together platonically. ^^


End file.
